Bob Wick is a committee of one. He is the judge and jury of Chargers jerseys, the equipment manager responsible for submitting the orders and distributing the merchandise.

He’s got your number and, if you’re good enough, he’s got your back.

Junior Seau was plenty good enough. Nearly 10 years since the iconic linebacker played his last game for the Chargers, on Dec. 29, 2002, Wick refuses to issue No. 55 to anyone else.

“First of all, he was a Hall of Fame player,” Wick said. “He was probably the best defensive player the Chargers ever had. It was just (a matter of) respect for him being a great player, knowing he was going to be in the Hall of Fame eventually.”

On the eve of the communal celebration of Seau’s life at Qualcomm Stadium, Dan Fouts’ No. 14 and Lance Alworth’s No. 19 were the only numbers officially retired by the local football franchise.

That list ought to be longer — Ron Mix’s No. 74 was once retired but pettily reissued after the Hall of Fame tackle signed with the Oakland Raiders — and it should probably be expanded to conform with the unofficial pantheon observed by the equipment manager.

Barring an explicit order from upper management, Wick says Seau’s No. 55 and LaDainian Tomlinson’s No. 21 will remain off-limits at Chargers Park. Wick, whose tenure with the team dates to 1979, also wants to withhold No. 18 in honor of Charlie Joiner and is observing at least a temporary moratorium on issuing No. 68 (Kris Dielman) and No. 43 (Darren Sproles).

Given the circumstances of Seau’s death, and the important questions it has raised, the topic of numeric tributes seems almost trivial. If uniform numbers carried any intrinsic importance, the New York Yankees would not have assigned Babe Ruth’s No. 3 to at least nine other players before belatedly removing it from circulation in 1948.

Yet short of a statue, the custom of retiring a uniform number comes pretty close to the pinnacle of athletic achievement on the local level. The modern athlete might play for several teams, and the great ones sometimes attain Hall of Fame status without a strong attachment to a single place. A retired number says you were not only special, you were ours.

Junior Seau spent three seasons with the Miami Dolphins and another four with the New England Patriots. Among the most bittersweet moments in Bolts history was Seau’s third-down tackle of Michael Turner in the 2008 AFC Championship Game — a moment that typified the freelancing linebacker’s intuitive daring, knack for the big play and helped pave the Patriots’ path to the Super Bowl.

If Seau blindsided his hometown by signing with the Patriots four days after a bloated “graduation” ceremony at Chargers Park, if his personal flaws sometimes surfaced on police blotters, his fans were too grateful to bear grudges.

The tremendous outpouring of affection following Seau’s suicide — the impromptu monuments that arose outside his home and his restaurant; Sunday’s surfside “paddle-out” in Oceanside — suggested that the wandering linebacker had never really left his hometown; that he had been estranged but never a stranger; and that he was a Bolt to the bone.

“Probably my greatest moment with Junior was at the ’94 Super Bowl,” Bob Wick said. “The team came out of the tunnel (before the game) and Junior was the first guy out. He was twirling around, dancing. ...

“He was such a good guy: always positive, always smiling, always asking, ‘What’s up?’ He was a nice guy about signing autographs, a hard worker. He’d be there early in the morning.”

Seau could be vain. He liked his jerseys cut short to expose his muscular midriff, and he favored tight sleeves to enhance his biceps. If he was inclined to carry himself like the Big Man On Campus, though, that’s what he was. Lesser Chargers would no sooner seek No. 55 than they would park in Dean Spanos’ space.

“Veteran players, they would never ask for his number,” Wick said. “Even if they did want that number, they knew it was Junior’s. It’s tough with 90-some players in camp — you have to double up on some numbers — but I don’t even have any practice jerseys with that number on it.”

Numerology is more superstition than science — and that may be generous — but

astronlogia.com ascribes mystical powers to No. 55, calling it a “combination of origin and annihilation.” It says ancient Spartans used to sculpt the number onto metal boards before battle to signify victory and the death of enemies.

Here in San Diego, No. 55 signifies the life and the death of a legend. Junior Seau should take it with him.